Three innovations addressing some of rail’s most concrete challenges – from intelligent infrastructure management to more efficient freight and next-generation signalling – have been selected as the winners of the 12th ERCI Innovation Awards, presented today at InnoTrans 2026, during the 15th edition and 30th anniversary of the world’s leading trade fair for transport technology.
For the European Railway Clusters Initiative – ERCI, the Awards are more than an annual competition; they are one of the ways in which ERCI performs its role as the European railway meta-cluster: bringing together innovation emerging from different regional ecosystems, giving promising market-ready solutions a European platform, and connecting more than 2,000 companies – particularly SMEs – with a wider railway community of industrial actors, research organisations, potential partners and customers.
Innovation starts in the regions – and gains value when it connects
The ERCI Innovation Awards are built around the territorial nature of European innovation.
Companies first emerge through competitions and selection processes organised within ERCI’s regional and national cluster ecosystems. Selected innovations then progress to the European level, creating a pipeline through which solutions developed locally can gain cross-border visibility and recognition. ERCI’s official Award framework assesses innovations against criteria including their innovative features, economic and social benefits for rail, integration of digital technologies, impact on human capital and the contribution of cooperation and networking to their development.
The 2026 edition attracted 29 submissions from across ERCI’s cluster network, all at Technology Readiness Level 7 or above, reflecting solutions already approaching or operating in real market environments.
In this sense, the Awards provide a practical example of what a European meta-cluster can add to regional innovation: not replacing the ecosystems in which innovation originates but connecting them and amplifying their reach.
Dirk-Ulrich Krüger, President of ERCI, said:
“Europe’s railway innovation does not originate in one place. It emerges every day from companies, SMEs, research organisations and industrial partnerships embedded in very different regional ecosystems. ERCI’s role is to connect that distributed capacity.”
“The Innovation Awards allow excellent solutions identified within our clusters to travel beyond their regional environment and gain a European stage. The three winners this year address very different railway challenges, but together they demonstrate something important: innovation becomes more valuable when it is visible, connected and able to reach the actors who can use it.”
“Presenting these companies at InnoTrans is therefore not simply about celebrating three winners. It is about bringing European innovation closer to the international railway market.”
THE 2026 WINNERS
Best SME
CAEmate, Italy – WeStatiX SHM
Nominated through Rail.S
WeStatiX SHM is an intelligent Digital Twin platform for structural health monitoring and asset management. It combines sensor information, physics-based engineering models and artificial intelligence to transform monitoring data into engineering insight on the actual behaviour and condition of infrastructure.
The solution is designed to support infrastructure owners and asset managers in moving from data collection towards predictive, evidence-based decisions on safety, resilience and maintenance.
CAEmate entered the European ERCI process through Rail.S’s SET4FUTURE competition, where WeStatiX SHM had previously been selected among the winning innovations.
Hannes Grosse, Infrastructure Solutions Europe, CAEmate:
“We know that this development can transform how complex infrastructure is monitored and provide genuinely usable data to support intelligent decisions – enabling safer, smarter and more resilient infrastructure for network operators. We are delighted to win this Best SME Award and strongly believe this solution responds to the needs of the international rail industry.”
Best Large Company
Innofreight Solutions, Austria – InnoBogie
Nominated through ACStyria
InnoBogie rethinks one of freight rail’s most established components. Designed for automated manufacturing, the lightweight high-performance freight bogie reduces traditional bogie weight by approximately 25%, while enabling higher payloads and contributing to lower wear, maintenance, noise and energy consumption.
The innovation illustrates how redesigning a mature railway component can generate benefits simultaneously in competitiveness, operational performance and resource efficiency.
Hartmut Maier, Technical Project Manager, Innofreight Solutions:
“We wanted to prove that even a 60-year-old industry standard can be rethought from scratch. Seeing more than 1,000 units successfully operating and receiving such strong market feedback confirms that approach. We are thrilled to receive this Award and to share our experience across the ERCI ecosystem.”
Coup de Cœur
The Signalling Company, Belgium – iEVC-RailOS
Nominated through Logistics in Wallonia
iEVC-RailOS is a universal on-board signalling platform designed to host ETCS together with multiple national Class B safety applications.
Its fully software-defined architecture enables multiple safety applications to operate through smaller, lighter and more energy-efficient equipment, offering fleet operators a more flexible approach to signalling migration and the progressive deployment of ETCS.
Romain Hourtiguet, Marketing Manager, The Signalling Company:
“We are honoured to receive the Coup de Coeur Award and thank ERCI and the judging panel for recognising the impact of our innovation. Speed, scalability and simplicity guide our work and are fundamental to accelerating ETCS adoption and deployment.”
Turning visibility into connections
The ERCI Innovation Awards do not end with the announcement of the winners.
Winners and finalists are brought into ERCI’s wider European communication and networking activities, including opportunities to present their technologies through dedicated webinars and to connect with organisations across the ERCI ecosystem.
Holding the 2026 ceremony at InnoTrans reinforces that pathway. This year’s exhibition brings together more than 3,100 exhibitors and is showcasing 180 world premieres across rolling stock, infrastructure, maintenance, AI, robotics and other areas of transport technology.
For ERCI, this is precisely where a meta-cluster can add value: connecting innovation developed within regional ecosystems with the European and international actors capable of taking it further.
About the ERCI Innovation Awards
The ERCI Innovation Awards recognise pioneering solutions developed by European rail industries.
The competition begins within ERCI member clusters at regional or national level and subsequently moves to a European selection stage. Awards are presented in three categories:
- Best SME
- Best Large Enterprise
- Coup de Cœur
The assessment considers the level of innovation compared with the state of the art, the economic benefits generated for users, the competitive advantage created for the innovating company, the innovation’s contribution to key societal and railway-sector challenges, the added value created through cooperation and networking, and its geographical and international market potential.
